STOCKHOLM SYNDROME, PART II
13 August 2011

One of the most important reasons I left Sweden was the Swedish attitude to alcohol. All conversations about how drunk people got etc. made me so sick and tired. Not to mention the way alcohol always serves as an excuse for almost everything stupid you can do, like "Oh, I was sooo drunk so I couldn't help betraying my girlfriend /etc.../, and I regret it so much"...

Yeah sure you are!

I don't want to sound boring or demoralising, but for god's sake, the decision to drink and to drink too much is always your own.

I love having good wine, a dram of whiskey, some sparkling, a pink Cosmo or a heavy Belgian Orval, I do - and I love their taste and how each of them fits the moment and how they enhance the ambiance and the spirits. But this, I feel, is an entire universe from the point "Let's drink to get drunk"!

Is Stockholm/Sweden by any means worse than other cities/countries in terms of alcohol? Definitely Yes (apart from the UK possibly). Of course people get drunk everywhere, in Sweden people tend to brag with how drunk they were. In most other European countries south of Sweden, people keep quiet about it. It's not an achievement! And even if they are drunk (which of course they also get) they try to act as if they are not. In Sweden it's the opposite.

To sum it up: Very uncivilized, in my opinion.

Luckily I think we can now see a trend towards a healthier socity with less alcohol (in some circles!). The Swedish alcohol supermarket Systembolaget has a larger range non-alcoholic beverages than ever before & it also seems like it's more accepted not to drink without getting the comment, "So you don't want to have fun tonight then?!"...

Or maybe it's just my generation getting older. And wiser. Luckily.